SSC CGL 2025 Tier-I · 24 September 2025, Shift 2 · General Awareness · Question 25 of 100

We transcribed this text from the pictures on a candidate's response sheet for this shift; the answer is the key SSC colour-marked on that sheet. Solution last reviewed 13 September 2026.

Where this paper and its answers come from

SSC does not publish CGL question papers or a public answer key. From 2025 the candidate response sheet prints every question and option as a picture, so the text here is transcribed from those pictures for this shift and checked against them independently; where the layout carries meaning, the picture is shown as well. Each answer is the key SSC colour-marked on that sheet. SSC released a tentative key for challenge and later its final one, both only to candidates behind a login, and the sheet does not say which of the two it carries. The solutions are written by UnlockIAS.

We doubt SSC's key on this question.

Read literally, 'excluded from industrial licensing' means exempted from it, the opposite of the keyed industries, which the 1991 policy kept under licence; the key reads the stem as 'excluded from delicensing', following NCERT's list of the product categories that still need a licence.

The answer below is still the option SSC's key marks, and we solve to that option.

Which sectors were largely excluded from industrial licensing after 1991?

(a)Defense and Telecom
(b)Alcohol, Cigarettes, Explosives
(c)Textiles and Fertilizers
(d)Agriculture and Education

Answer

Why

Correct — B. The 1991 policy abolished industrial licensing for almost all industries. NCERT lists what stayed under licence: 'alcohol, cigarettes, hazardous chemicals, industrial explosives, electronics, aerospace and drugs and pharmaceuticals'.

So the sectors left out of the delicensing, still needing a licence, include alcohol, cigarettes and explosives → option (b).

Why the others are wrong

(a)
Defense and Telecom — Half right at best. Defence equipment did stay under licence, but telecom was not on the 1991 list of licensed industries, so the pair fails.
(c)
Textiles and Fertilizers — Textiles and fertilisers are not on the 1991 list of industries kept under licence. The policy did not hold them back from delicensing.
(d)
Agriculture and Education — Farming and schooling are not manufacturing industries, so industrial licensing under the Industries (Development and Regulation) Act, 1951 never covered them.

Concept

Before 1991, the Industries (Development and Regulation) Act, 1951 required a licence to set up or expand most industrial units, the system later called the licence raj.

The New Industrial Policy of 1991 abolished licensing for all but a short list, which included alcoholic drinks, cigarettes, industrial explosives, hazardous chemicals, and electronic aerospace and defence equipment.

The list has shrunk since 1991. The key and NCERT describe the 1991 policy, not today's shorter list of licensed industries.

Key facts

New Industrial Policy, 1991: industrial licensing abolished for almost all industries.
NCERT's list of product categories left under licensing: alcohol, cigarettes, hazardous chemicals, industrial explosives, electronics, aerospace, and drugs and pharmaceuticals.
Industrial licences are issued under the Industries (Development and Regulation) Act, 1951.
NCERT: the industries now reserved for the public sector are a part of atomic energy generation and some core activities in railway transport.

Study next

Industries (Development and Regulation) Act, 1951Industries reserved for the public sector after 1991Liberalisation, privatisation and globalisation: the 1991 reforms

Common traps

Reading 'excluded from licensing' as 'freed from licensing'. The keyed list is the industries that kept the licence requirement.
Picking defence and telecom because defence stayed licensed. Telecom did not, so the pair fails.

The abolition of licensing for most industries is asked as an Assertion-Reason item at 19 Sep 2025, 16:00, GA Q.22, and 1991 as the start of industrial liberalisation at 24 Sep 2024, 16:00, GA Q.17.

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.

Topic: Economic Scene — all 144 SSC CGL questions on it, every solved shift.